Baby's Last Road Trip
by KleeZeeNex
Summary: Castiel's first moments as a human aren't exactly scrapbook material, but if Dean had known that this was the last time he would drive the Impala, he might have grabbed his camera on the way out. We'll call this pre-croatverse, since there are zombies but the gang hasn't reached Chitaqua yet.
1. Don't Cry Over Fallen Angels

**A/N: All right, ladies and germs, this is the story that I mentioned in my other story, "It Could Be Worse." You could think of it as a prequel for that, but really it's paced differently and includes a lot more Chuck and Bobby and that one guy from "The End" who you see for about four seconds. The whole thing will be about five or six chapters. However, like "It Could Be Worse," this is in Dean's POV. I would beg you not to run away from the first person POV, but y'all seemed to like it in ICBW so I'll just chill out for now.  
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**Uh, set up! We'll say this starts right after the Croatoan virus has hit major cities. You know, that awkward moment in an apocalypse when everybody is in a panic but the phones and radios are still working. Sam is already Lucy-fied, and Dean and the crew are trying to not get eaten and stuff.  
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**That should be it. I hope you all enjoy, and check the bottom of each chapter for previews of the next chapter.  
**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural.  
**

* * *

It's real sudden. Like one minute Cas is an angel (_a half-angel_, I sometimes think, but I'd never say that to his face), and the next he just isn't. Like some light in him goes out, or gets snatched away when he isn't looking.

We're all sitting around Bobby's little kitchen table when it happens. And by "all" I mean Bobby, Cas, Chuck, and some guy Bobby knows whose name I haven't bothered to remember yet. Nobody else will believe us. They want to believe the news that crackles over the radio. Fly to Japan, they have a cure. Go to this clinic, we've got vaccines. Nobody wants to listen when I say it's a demonic virus, and you're all screwed until I hand over my meat suit to an archangel, and happy apocalypse, by the way.

I'm sure we'll collect more people once half the planet is roasted and no one has anywhere else to go, but I try not to think about that too often. I have to remember that I am not saying "yes," and no one is roasting the planet. But the Croatoan virus is spreading, and that sucks just as bad.

Anyway.

We're talking about the end of the world. Usual crap.

"I think this is the safest place for us to be," I say, because ever since Sam said "yes" I have become the wet blanket of the group, and I hate myself. "We've got supplies, and a panic room in case we get ambushed."

New Guy shakes his head. I really do not like New Guy. "We'll run out of supplies eventually, and we might be boxed in by the time that happens," he says. "We should head south—I hear there's less infection there."

"I can get past the Croatoans to obtain supplies if it comes to that," Cas points out, and I nod because it's not a half-bad idea, and he's trying to back my play. That or he's just really uncomfortable whenever he's not being the primary wet blanket of the group. Or maybe he just doesn't like New Guy, either. I don't know. What does it matter, really?

Bobby tries to roll his wheelchair closer to the table, but he just ends up hitting the one of the table legs and bouncing back to where he was. From where I'm sitting, I'm the only one who can see Cas nudge the wheelchair chair sideways so that Bobby can go forward again without the leg in his way. I don't say anything about it, and Bobby doesn't, either. He just rolls up to the edge of the table and says, "Well I say we should keep moving." Because Bobby is a traitor.

Or because Bobby wants to make sure that we're not staying put on his account. Because God didn't think to leave us a van with a wheelchair lift when He peaced out.

I'm not suggesting we stay put because of the wheelchair, just to be clear. But I'm not really in the mood to tiptoe all around Bobby's pride, either. "If we keep running, we _will_ run into Croatoans, and someone _will _get infected, because that is just our damn luck," I say, and I say it a little too loud, because if I have to be the wet blanket then I may as well get to yell whenever I feel like it.

New Guy is shaking his head again. He does that a lot, I'm noticing, and I add it to the growing list of things that New Guy does just to piss me off. "The Croatoans are just going to multiply, and eventually we won't be able to move at all. We drive as far as we can while we can, maybe out of the United States if we have to…"

And I know it's very irresponsible of me, but I tune him out. I'll go back to being manager of Team Free Will once I'm sure I won't spontaneously light New Guy on fire.

Maybe Cas can smite him for me. Can Cas still smite people? Do angels who rebell from Heaven get to do that? I'm about to ask him, but then I look past Cas and notice Chuck curled up in a chair with his knees drawn up to his chin. He's picking at a splinter that's poking out of the table, and I interrupt New Guy to say, "Hey, Prophet Chuck. Got anything to add?"

Chuck looks up, says, "No," and then he looks like he's about to go back to picking at the table again, but he doesn't. Instead, he kind of gasps before his eyes dart right to Cas.

I follow Chuck's gaze, and the second my eyes land on Cas he sits up straight like he just remembered that he left his curling iron on or something. His eyes go wide, and then he stands up so fast that he knocks his knees on the table, causing it to bump Bobby's chair again. Then Cas spins in a circle, looking at the floor. When he looks up again, he croaks, "It's gone," to no one in particular.

I'm the one who asks, "What's gone?" because I am fully aware that the half-angel is my responsibility.

But Cas doesn't really answer my question. His shoulders are heaving, up and down, up and down, and it occurs to me that I've never really seen him breathe before. "It's _gone_," Cas says again, and he spins in another circle. I'm pretty sure that whatever he's looking for is not under his feet, but Cas sure thinks it is.

Bobby backs up from the table, probably expecting some sort of explosion of feathers or whatever else is supposed to come with an angel freak-out. Bobby's probably researched all about it. There's a book at the library, I'll bet. _Angel Freak-Outs: The Unofficial Biography of Angels That Have Freaked the Hell Out._ By some other prophet we maybe haven't met yet.

One who drinks a lot less often than Chuck, preferably.

"Nothing's gone, Feathers," Bobby tries to reason. I don't know if he expects Cas to just calm right down and say, "Whew, you're right! My mistake," and sit down to finish discussing the apocalypse, but I think Bobby's an idiot if he does. Then again, Bobby is using that voice that people use to talk people off of ledges. He's not trying to reason with Cas, I realize. He's just talking at him.

I don't like the idea of it, but it seems to work well enough. Cas's eyes find Bobby's and he stops turning in circles. He's still breathing too heavily, though. "Do angels hyperventilate?" New Guy asks, because New Guy is a freaking genius.

Then again, Cas really is breathing hard. I shrug. "Cas?" Cas's eyes slide over to me, and I raise my hands in front of my chest. I'm talking him off the ledge, now. "Just calm down," I say. "Something happening on Angel Radio?"

That was the wrong thing to say.

Cas just collapses. Really. Just drops to his knees, bracing one hand against the floor, and squeezes his eyes shut. He whispers, "No," and I don't know if he's answering my question or if he's just talking to himself.

I do know that I need to get everybody else out of there. I don't know why. I know that they're all of a sudden making me really uneasy. So I say, "Give us a minute, guys." They don't hesitate to obey, and I think it's because they're grateful to get away from this steaming pile of _uncomfortable_. Chuck picks up Cas's chair and puts it back on four legs as he goes. I didn't even notice that Cas knocked it over.

Chuck is the last one out, and I kneel next to Cas.

"Hey, um…" Oh, this is going swell.I try again. "So, you gotta tell me what's wrong, because I don't really get angel stuff, and…" But I trail off, because Cas is shaking his head, staring at his lap.

"It's not angel stuff." His voice is low and dead. Every now and then his breathing hitches like he hasn't quite caught his breath yet, but that's evened out for the most part.

"Okay," I drawl. "Then… You hurt or something? Sick?"

Cas laughs, then. It is a weird, creepy laugh.

"What?" I demand, just to get him to stop it.

He stops instantly. Shakes his head again. "_I_ am not… angel… stuff."

He is obviously trying to be difficult.

"You're not making sense," I snap, because huggy gooey time has expired. I cannot do it anymore. "Tell me what's wrong, already."

"There are no words for it," Cas says.

"Make some up, then, Man, you're starting to scare me."

Cas goes really still. I think he stops breathing for a second, and I'm not sure whether or not to worry about that. "I believe I am mortal," he finally says.

I don't say anything for a long time. Cas has gone back to breathing. His back is bowed into a steep curve, and I watch as each breath slightly tightens his trench coat over his shoulders.

When I'm about to think of Jimmy Novak, I finally say, "See, was that so hard?"

Cas just breathes. I'm pretty sure he's got the hang of it by now.

"Mortal," I clarify, and Cas closes his eyes again when I say it. "Like… like you can't… _anything_?" Cas doesn't answer, and I take that as a "yes." I sigh. "Any idea why?"

Cas shrugs.

"Well this sucks," I say, and immediately want to kick myself in the face as soon as it comes out of my mouth. I am at a total loss. I seriously consider putting a hand on Cas's shoulder, but some highly irrational corner of my mind is afraid that Cas might shatter into a million pieces if I touch him. So I just say, "We'll figure this out."

Cas doesn't answer. He's rubbing his hands together like he just now noticed that he has two of them. Then he shuffles to his feet, walks around me, and disappears upstairs.

I don't know what do do other than watch him go.

* * *

Cas hides out in one of the upstairs bedrooms all night. New Guy leaves, and Chuck has been sleeping in Bobby's library. I spend most of the night outside with Bobby, staring at wrecked cars and saying absolutely nothing.

Something about a fallen angel just makes the apocalypse seem a whole lot more hopeless. And apparently hopelessness equals lots of endless quiet.

Bobby goes back inside sometime around midnight, but I stay on the front porch until I can see the sky turn from black to hazy blue. Then I stand up, crack my back, and mutter to myself, "Here we go," before I walk back inside.

I wander into the library, where Chuck is still sleeping and Bobby is thumbing through a Bible at his desk. He raises his eyebrows at me when I walk in, and his look says, _Well, it's worth a shot_. I shrug in response, but we both know that he won't find anything about what to do with a fallen angel.

When I get to the living room, I happen to glance at the stairs. Cas freezes when he sees that I've spotted him. It's almost funny—the back of his hair is sticking up and his shirt is half-tucked-in, no coat, no jacket. He looks remarkably like some teenager sneaking out of his girlfriend's house at the crack of dawn to keep from waking the parents.

Or he looks like a freshly-fallen angel who just slept for the first time in his life. That thought makes the whole thing very un-funny, and I clear my throat. "You ah… You hungry?"

Cas puts a hand on his stomach, considering my question. Then he seems to deflate and nods once.

I nod in the direction of the kitchen. "Breakfast." Cas nods again and descends the stairs.

So far, so good.

In the kitchen, I look around in the cabinets while Cas stands beside the table and works on being awkward. "Hey, do you like… Nevermind," I say, because how would Cas know what he likes? So I grab a box of cereal and decide that that will have to do.

"I can do it," Cas objects when I pour the cereal into a bowl, but I say, "Shaddup," because I'm in the middle of a flashback from when Sammy was three and he kept wanting to hold the bowl for me when I poured the milk over the cereal, but he'd move the bowl at the last second so that I'd end up spilling the milk on the table.

Sammy thought it was hilarious, and I have to admit, it was, a little. Looking back, I mean.

"Dean," Cas says. I look up, wondering if Cas is still a little psychic, but no… I've poured too much milk in the bowl, and it's overflowing onto Bobby's counter. "Are you sure I can't—"

"I got it," I bark, and Cas actually flinches. I sigh, grabbing some paper towels to mop up the mess. "Sit down, will you?" I make sure my voice is softer this time, and Cas wipes the kicked-puppy look off his face as he slides into the same chair he sat in yesterday. I put the bowl and a spoon down in front of him, careful not to spill anymore.

Cas picks up the spoon, and just holds it for a minute. He's glaring into the cereal.

I'm about to tell him just how gross soggy cereal is, but then he says, "You're staring."

"Uh… Sorry." I put my hands in my pockets, take them out again, and then decide to just sit at the table across from Cas. I make sure to look casual, resting my head in my hand and staring at a crack in the floor.

_Crunch, crunch, crunch._ There's a pause, and I imagine Cas tilting his head at his cereal bowl. He's probably not, but that's the picture that pops into my head. Then, _crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch…_

Since I'm looking that way, I see Bobby round the corner and enter the kitchen. But Cas doesn't look up until Bobby stops inside the entryway and says, "Uh."

That seems to be everyone's favorite word lately. Apocalypse has turned us all into monosyllabic Neanderthals.

Cas looks up to find Bobby staring at him, and he freezes much like he did on the stairs, except this time he's got a spoon halfway in his mouth.

Again, I manage not to laugh.

"Dig up anything useful?" I ask Bobby, but he's too busy staring at Cas to answer. "Bobby?"

Bobby holds up a hand to shush me. "There's an Angel of the Lord eating Fruit Loops at my kitchen table, Boy," he says. "I need a minute."

I swear Cas rolls his eyes. But then he goes back to his cereal, swirling it around until the milk turns pink.

Bobby seems to snap out of his shock after a few seconds, or maybe he just realizes that he's getting on Cas's nerves. "Nothing yet," he tells me. "But I'm not the one who's an expert in… the extra-celestial." He looks at Cas, who has started to eat his cereal one piece at a time.

"Yeah, well, our celestial expert is busy adjusting to being _not_ celestial," I tell Bobby.

Cas drops his spoon in his bowl and glares at both of us. "You _do_ realize I can still _hear _perfectly," he says.

"Cas…" I am so sick of feeling guilty. "We're not trying to—"

"You don't have to talk about me like I'm not here," Cas goes on, but he's shifted his glare back to his bowl of milk. "I have no angelic abilities. I do not know why. And I can no longer hear my brothers and sisters. I have no answers for you, and you will not find answers in any of your books. Just—just…"

Chuck chooses that moment to shuffle into the kitchen, clutching a blanket around his shoulders. "Anybody want coffee?" he says through a yawn.

The three of us stare at him in unison, and Chuck blinks. "What?"

And I can't help it. This time, I laugh. It's a half-hearted, crackling chuckle that goes on and on.

Nobody joins me, but I kind of expected that.

* * *

**A/N: And this is the part when we all realize that KleeZeeNex is not above begging for reviews. Can't really do it properly via interwebs, but let's just say that reviews make me super happy and I would love it if you fine people could take a moment to tell me how you liked it, or didn't. Pointing out grammatical and spelling errors is, well, a little obnoxious, but also welcome. If you simply refuse to review because you have got better things to do than feed a writer's soul, then I'll just say thanks for reading and I hope you liked it!**

**Next Chapter: "A Country Song, But With Zombies." In which we find out that Cas can't hold his liquor, can't shoot a gun, and probably wouldn't make a great linebacker, either.  
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	2. A Country Song, But With Zombies

**A/N: Big thanks to everyone who has commented and/or is following this story. I love to hear from those reading my stories, so, be a good person today, and review, review, review! It's right up there with recycling, and rewinding your vhs tapes before you take them back to the video store.  
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**What? No one rents vhs tapes anymore? Well Dean still uses cassettes, and he's cool, so if you review and rewind your tapes, you'll be cool too.  
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**Anyway, on to the chapter, and just a reminder, previews for the next chapter can be found at the bottom.  
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**Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural, or Polar Pops.**

* * *

We have to leave Bobby's house. Staying there depended on having an angel up our sleeve, and our angel is broken. Nobody says it out loud, of course. Not even New Guy. New Guy's name turns out to be Yeager, by the way, and Yeager is not that bad.

He helps me get one of the vans from the junkyard working, and then we're off. Yeager, Bobby, and Chuck are in the van, and Cas and I follow in my Baby.

As we pull onto the road, my eyes land on the cell phone car charger that Sam got for the Impala two years ago. God, that's going to be useful. At least as long as the cell signals are still working.

"Where do we plan on going?" Cas asks from the passenger seat, snapping me out of my thoughts. He's not really interested, I can tell. He's been practicing asking stupid human questions for the past couple days.

"To the Island of Misfit Toys," I answer automatically, because that song has been stuck in my head all day. That reminds me to pop a new tape in the cassette player, and Metallica is like washing a bad taste out of my mouth.

I'm pretty sure that Cas is giving me his good ol' _WTF_ stare, but I keep my eyes on the road. "We're heading south," I finally tell him. "Until we run into something nasty. Then we head elsewhere."

When Cas doesn't respond, I spare a glance at him. The ex-angel is sound asleep against the window with the seat belt pulling at his bent neck.

"Well you are just going to be a big ball of fun," I say, watching the passing streetlights cast shadows over his face. Then I notice that the car has drifted too far to the right, and I focus again on staying on the road.

With another thought, I turn the music down. Cas doesn't really notice.

* * *

We do run into something nasty. Of course.

It's zombies. Of course.

They pounce on the van while we're at a gas station in Nebraska. We knew that we were going to have to change direction soon—the towns we passed through were getting more and more deserted where infection has come and gone—but gas is kind of important.

We would _not_ have stopped, though, had we known that about seven Croatoans had been infected there and were still hanging around. I didn't know. I wanted to blame Yeager, because he was leading the pack and all, but he couldn't really have known either.

The first one to come at the van is still wearing a gray uniform. For what, I don't know. I don't know if he worked at the gas station or if he was just passing through when he got infected. And the first thing I think when I see the thing is, _damn it, we almost made it to Kansas._

How stupid is that?

Cas is already opening my glove compartment and pulling out my gun. He hands it to me, and I'm about to tell him to back me up, but then I remember. So I say, "Stay in the car," and slam my door shut behind me.

Yeager has already killed the one in the uniform, but two are on the hood of the van and I can see more coming out of the gas station. I shoot three in the head before they can get close, but I miss the fourth. It tackles me, and my gun skids across the pavement.

The next few seconds are a blur of sharp panic, because I can't see past the Croatoan on top of me and what the hell is Yeager doing and holy crap Bobby and Chuck are still trapped in the van and, oh yeah, zombie apocalypse.

Insert a long string of curses I currently do not have time for.

I can hear shots go off, and I'm hoping that's Yeager finishing off the Croatoans that are attacking the van, because, _hello_, I could use some help over here. Then something suddenly slams into the Croatoan, and it's off of me.

I sit up, wondering why Yeager didn't just shoot the thing, but then I see that the person who just body-checked a zombie is not Yeager.

"Cas, _no_!"

Cas is trying to pin the Croatoan's shoulders to the pavement, but he doesn't have enough weight behind him to do it. The Croatoan is clawing at him, trying to get at his throat, trying to draw blood…

I'm stuck trying to decide if I should drag Cas away or waste time looking for my gun. So I settle for standing there like an idiot and yelling, "Cas, get off the zombie! _Get off the zombie_!"

Yeager has noticed the commotion by now, and he points the gun at Cas and the Croatoan. "Need a shot, guys," he calls, and Cas takes that as his cue to drop to his side. The Croatoan latches on, though, sending them both into a roll until the Croatoan is looming over Cas, lashing out—

And then its head explodes as Yeager fires a final shot.

Cas pushes the body off of him, wiping at the splattered blood on his face. I jog over and yank him up too roughly. Cas winces, but lets me pat his chest and shoulders, looking for cuts. "Are you okay?" I demand.

"Fine, Dean."

"Son of a bitch. That thing didn't—"

"Dean."

"—didn't draw any blood or—"

Cas sends his eyes skyward before knocking my hands away and shoving past me. I watch him walk to the Impala while he wipes his sleeve—well, my sleeve, my borrowed shirt—over his face again.

We're going to have to find him more clothes. My wardrobe is not going to last between the two of us.

* * *

We've been forced to head east, and I have been forced to show Cas how to shoot a gun.

It is not as fun as I'd imagined.

"So…" I look around at the wooded area we're half-camping out in. Really, we're just pulled over and sleeping in the cars. Nobody feels comfortable sleeping under the stars anymore. "Um, shoot that Polar Pop cup."

Cas raises his gun, shoots, and misses.

Six times.

"Okay, new lesson." This was so much easier with Sam, for some reason. "Say you're trying to shoot me. No—_no, _not—do not point the thing at me, damn it, just… Okay, say you're trying to shoot that _tree_…"

Cas hesitantly points the gun at the tree. I nod when he glances at me. "Okay, now you're keeping your gun on it. Him. Croatoan, zombie, whatever. Hold the gun… Yeah. But you're way too close. You wanna stay out of arm's reach, or the else the tree can… erm, I mean…"

Cas sighs and lowers the gun. "We can do this later," he suggests.

"No, we cannot do it later. If we run into Croatoans again, I don't want you going at them like a damn linebacker. Have I mentioned that you're an idiot, by the way?"

"Yes, Dean." There's some sarcasm leaking into Cas's voice, but I ignore it.

"Good. Gun up. And back the hell off the tree, that's how you get your gun taken from you, and for the love of—"

"Need a hand?"

I whip around, and there's Yeager. If I peek through the trees I can see Chuck and Bobby hovering by the van. They're both staring at us.

Yeager steps up beside me and puts his thumbs in his pockets. "Why don't you take a break?" he says to me. "I'll handle this for a while."

I'm about to tell him to shove it, but then I look at Cas. His hands are shaking on the gun, and he won't look at me anymore. So I grumble, "Go for it," and walk off.

"You all right?" Bobby asks me when I lean against the hood of the Impala. Chuck wisely keeps his mouth shut.

I cross my arms and draw a circle in the dirt with my boot. "Whaddayamean?"

Bobby gestures to the woods where Yeager has taken over teaching Cas how to shoot a tree to death. "You've been yelling at Cas for the past twenty minutes," he points out. "You know better than that. Probably done such a number on his nerves that he'll never shoot straight."

"I've been yelling at Cas for two years," I correct him. "And it's not like he was gonna shoot anything, anyway."

"You're underestimating him."

I'm about to come up with some snide retort, but then I hear two shots fire from the woods. All is quiet, and then a minute later Yeager and Cas come pushing through the trees. "Check it out," Yeager says, holding up the remaining pieces of the Polar Pop cup. He claps Cas on the shoulder. "Got it in two."

Cas's face is blank when he hands the gun back to me. I take it, and offer him a forced smile. "Way to go, Buddy," I say.

Cas looks up at me like he can still see right into my soul, and I blanch. "Dude," I protest, because I didn't do anything to deserve this stare-down. Then Cas breaks eye-contact and admits, "Yeager shot it."

I look at Yeager, who shrugs, sheepish. Bobby takes off his hat just to swat Yeager with it, muttering, "Idgit."

"Let's get back on the road, huh?" is all I can think to say. "I'm starving."

We don't find a stocked convenient store for another four hours. I don't know if that's a good sign or a bad one.

* * *

We find a deserted liquor store when we pass through Missouri. There's not much left in it, but nobody really cares. We were just looking for a secure place (that isn't my backseat) to sleep for the night, and it was this or a Wal-Mart.

Motels have too many entrances, too many windows, and we gave up on them days ago.

Chuck has disappeared in the back of the store, and I yell at him to stay close, because I haven't gotten to scope out the area yet. He comes back a minute later with a bottle of whiskey in each hand, and I immediately go from scolding to, "Bless you, oh prophet of the Lord."

Chuck and Yeager think that's funny. Cas does not.

"Bobby, get in here, Chuck found dinner," I call out to the van. He's still looking around the parking lot for signs of threats, and oh yeah, I'm supposed to be doing the same thing in the back. So I bring Chuck with me to find the back door so that we can make sure nothing is hiding in the dumpsters.

Once we're all satisfied that nothing is lurking around waiting to eat us, we sit in an almost-circle near the cash registers so that we can pass bottles around.

Everybody seems to forget that Cas has never had a drink before, and he only ate half of his bag of pretzels two hours ago. So when half an hour later Cas gets up without a word to stumble outside, nobody really worries about it.

Then we hear the van start up.

"Balls," Bobby growls at the same time when I leap up and say, "You left the keys in the _van_?" I don't wait for his answer before sprinting outside to investigate.

I find Cas in the driver's seat, playing with the radio.

"Uh, Cas?" I lean through the open window.

Cas ignores me, wrinkling his nose at the whiny static.

"Cas."

Cas gets to a string of southern gospel stations that have somehow managed to stay on the air, and he promptly stabs through them. "Where's that song?" he slurs.

"What."

"Th'song… the one about the lady named Betty. The one that gets on your nerves, but you keep it on sometimes because I like it."

I bite back a "that's what she said," because that would just lead to an overly-literal argument that I'm not really in the mood for. "You're drunk," I announce instead.

"Irrelevant." Cas pauses on a Miley Cyrus song, tilting his head and beginning to hum along.

"Oh, for the love of…" I push off of the door. "Try not to freeze out here. And turn the engine off," I tell him, and then I go back inside.

When I get back to the loose circle, I see that Yeager has finished off one bottle and is now holding it protectively against his chest. "Guys, when I die…" he starts.

"Quit bein' so damn morbid," Bobby says.

I sit down next to Chuck, snagging the second bottle from him. Meanwhile, Yeager has resumed his monologue.

"I just… guys, look. Guys." Yeager waves his bottle in front of him, then notices that he's let the bottle get too far away from him so he hugs it close again. "You can't let me be a zombie," he says. "If you even _think_ I'm infected, I mean… just… I can't be a zombie, guys."

"I am too sober for this conversation," Bobby declares, and I pass him the full bottle.

"Dean understands," Yeager blurts, staring at me. "You get me, right?"

I stare back, and I can't respond, because I'm not drunk enough for this, either. So I turn to Chuck. "You got any drunken last requests to make, Prophet?" I ask, nudging his knee with mine.

"Nah." Chuck leans against the counter, folding his arms behind his head. "If I get infected, just let me flip. I'd be a super bad-ass Croat zombie."

We all laugh at that, and I murmur, "Croats. Yeah, that's what they are."

That leads to a very interesting but mostly incoherent conversation about the monsters we've gotten to name in the past. Turns out Yeager discovered a sub-species of Wendigo in Mexico that he named "Marilyns" because they reminded him of an ex girlfriend he had once.

Chuck then tries to end the argument with, "How about I'm a prophet of the Lord so I named all of them, so I win." And that's when Cas chooses to join us again.

Cas barrels in, hops over Yeager, and drops to his knees beside me to announce, with an expansive wave of his hands, "Dean, Dean, country music _understands me_."

There is a beat of silence.

"That is fantastic," I say, and then I push on Cas's chest to gain a foot of personal space. Unfortunately the movement is too much for Cas, so he topples backwards onto the floor and stays there.

Bobby, Yeager, and Chuck burst into hysterical laughter, and I don't join in until Cas props himself up on his elbows with a wide grin splitting his face.

Then I laugh for a very, very long time.

* * *

**A/N: Anybody who can guess what song Cas was talking about in the van gets a gold star and my official stamp of approval.  
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**Next Chapter****: "Lessons from God and Avatar and Dean Winchester" Dean remembers Sam, and Castiel remembers licorice. We got yer angst right here folks, coming right up!**


	3. Lessons from God and Dean and Avatar

**Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural**

* * *

Sometimes we pass other people while we're foraging in the same food markets or drug stores. We stop a lot and sometimes rest for days at a time because we're not real sure where we're going, anyway-plus, gas is hard to come by. We hardly ever see other people staying in homes or hanging around towns anymore, though. Everyone is moving, moving, moving. "Headed to that clinic in Seattle," some people say, and I've learned to keep my mouth shut after wishing them the best of luck.

I'm sifting through a cart full of t-shirts at a dollar store when I wonder for the first time if we're going to be the last ones left. And if it's down to us four, which one will outlive the others? Then I figure that it doesn't really matter, because even if one of us is the last man standing, who could survive being that alone?

"These are all smalls," I call to Cas, mostly just to hear someone's voice in the dead quiet of the dead town.

Cas doesn't answer, though, and I figure he's engrossed in something more important than entertaining me. "You could try some on, anyway," I call again.

Again, nothing.

I walk back to the health and beauty isle where I left him. There is a neat pile of generic aspirin and toothpaste in the floor, but no Cas.

"Cas." I'm yelling now, so loudly that Chuck, Bobby, and Yeager can probably hear me three stores down the strip mall. "Cas!" I stomp outside and scan the parking lot, the street, the—and there he is, down the road, past the Taco Bell, staring up at a church on the corner.

I make sure to walk slowly toward him, trying to get my nerves to settle down. The Taco Bell almost still smells like a Taco Bell, I note, or that could be my imagination. I pause at the sign in front of the church parking lot. _THY KINGDOM COME_, it reads. I check the back of the sign, but it's blank except for where someone has spray-painted,_ EAT MORE CHIKIN._

"Are you trying to give me a heart attack?" I say when I approach him, but I make sure that I'm not yelling. Cas looks pitiful enough already.

"Sorry," he says without taking his eyes off of the church. He's eying the cross perched on the roof, actually. It is the shiniest thing I've seen in months.

I stand behind Cas's shoulder for a minute, wondering whether to ditch him or tell him to get a move on. In the end I decide to keep quiet and stand there, waiting.

Cas keeps quiet, too, staring.

Finally I clear my throat. "You, ah, just planning on standing here all day?" I ask.

Cas says nothing.

"You can't just stand in a church parking lot until Hell freezes over," I say, then reconsider. "Well, probably," I amend. "You'll definitely have to pee before then, anyway."

Cas says nothing.

I sigh. "Don't make me push you," I say, because it worked in that brothel that one time.

And Cas goes, but this time the look he shoots me is less terrified and more resigned. He pulls at the glass doors, finds them unlocked, and enters the chapel. I watch his back as he hovers at the back row of pews for approximately six seconds before he backs up a step, turns around, and walks back out.

"Well that was—" But Cas blows right past me and plops down on the steps with his back to me. "Right," I say, but I don't think Cas is listening. "Well I'm gonna check if there's anything useful in there."

Cas says nothing.

I'm a little relieved that the chapel looks untouched, if a little dusty. I walk past the pews, though, past the altar, and into a hallway that I'm guessing leads to classrooms or—hopefully—a kitchen. Maybe some clothes that were waiting to be donated, because Cas isn't going to be able to wear my jeans anymore if he gets any skinnier.

There is a kitchen in the basement, but the only things in it are two bottles of water in a refrigerator that doesn't work anymore. I snag the waters and search the other rooms. One _is_ a classroom, with a round table and wall posters clad with Polaroids of smiling kids. Most of them are wearing shirts that say _VBS 2009_. Kids were happy, once, I guess. That's nice.

A couple pictures have fallen to to the floor; I pick one up and stick it to an empty space. The tape holds for a second, and then the picture flutters back to the floor.

The last room I check is a bathroom, and I almost walk right back out, because we have more important things to worry about than hand soap. But then the smell hits me. I know this smell, but the door has already swung open and I can see the black shoe poking from behind the wall and then I'm stepping inside, daring myself to look.

There are things that I see, and things that I try not to. I see a man, mid-forties, maybe, with graying hair and a sunken face, lying on the bathroom floor in front of the sink. He's dressed in a navy suit with a gray tie. I see the blood, old and black and crusted underneath him. I see a wedding band on his finger, and a tiny gold cross pinned to his jacket.

Everything else—the gun on the floor, the red spray on the mirror, the bible open and abandoned in the corner, the Polaroid clutched in his bony hand—everything else I try my best not to see, but I do, and I back out and slam the door shut so hard the wood cracks.

The water is heavy in my hands, and my feet shuffle quickly across the carpet as I find the stairs again. I climb them slowly and deliberately, wondering if the world still spins the same way it did two years ago when those kids were happy.

Cas is standing near the glass doors when I push through them. "Find anything?" he asks.

I toss him a bottle of water. He catches it, and I quip, "Hey, you think this is holy w—"

"No."

I try to chuckle, not at my bad joke but at Cas's flat tone. Something like a laugh comes out, but it sounds more like something crawled down my throat and died there, and Cas's eyes flick to mine. He studies me, and I'm too tired care or retreat. But then he starts, "Dean, are you—" and I cut him off with, "Let's go grab that toothpaste, your breath smells like ass."

I don't know how to tell you what frustrated pity looks like, but that's the expression that crosses Cas's face before he spares a last glance at the church and nods. Then he descends the steps and leads the way back. By the time we reach the Impala, though, I've forgotten about the toothpaste, and I slide into the back seat and lie down with my feet bent against the door.

Some time later Chuck is asking me about my keys, and I pass them forward in what I can only describe as a moment of exhaustion-induced insanity. But then the engine rumbles, and it's like a drug or a lullaby or both, because soon I am dead to the world.

* * *

Cas will try to start conversation every now and then, even though he sucks at it. When it's just me and Cas in the car, we'll pass a farm or a library and he'll comment, "I looked for God there, once."

"You looked for God everywhere," I pointed out the first time he said this, and then I couldn't get him to speak again for the next three hours. Now when he says it I just reply, "Oh, how was that?" And sometimes he doesn't answer, but sometimes he'll tell me a short story about a cow or a grad student he met there.

When we hit Indianapolis, I take advantage of the abandoned roads to go down one-way streets the wrong way every chance I get. Bobby calls me three times to ask where I went and to tell me to knock it off, but I keep at it. So when I hear Cas sigh from the passenger seat, I think it's because I'm peeling out of a roundabout that I've just circled four times. But when I look over I see that Cas has his eyes trained on a movie theater settled behind an apartment complex just ahead.

"What?" I ask, finally setting the car straight again.

"I looked for God there," Cas says.

"Man, I hope you thought to stretch your search outside the continental U.S."

The look Cas gives me at that is one part hilarious and two parts frightening.

I cough. "Okay, uh, how was that?" I ask, back on script.

Cas smiles, though we've long passed the theater by now. "I watched _Avatar_ and ate Twizzlers for the first time." He leans against the door with his head propped in his hand. I keep telling him not to lean against the door, but he always forgets.

"Twizzlers," I mutter through a short chuckle. I try to picture it, Cas sitting in the crowded theater. Was he wearing the 3-D glasses? I wonder if he got teary when Sigourney Weaver's character died, like Sam did, though he always denied it.

I pause for a minute, a strange thought rolling around in my head, and then I finally say, "I should have been there."

"You didn't know about Detroit, Dean," Cas answers dutifully, like he's said a hundred other times during a hundred other guilt trips.

But this isn't about Detroit this time, and I blanch. "I meant the theater," I say, wondering if Cas somehow knew that I was thinking about Sam. "We were friends. I saw Avatar. I like Twizzlers." I feel anger boil up somewhere in my chest, and can't quite figure out why. "I mean… I mean, hell, Cas, didn't you ever get lonely?"

Cas is looking at me. I know he's looking at me, but I keep my eyes trained on the road. "You weren't interested in looking for God," Cas says. His voice is careful, confused. He's not sure where I'm going with this, and I'm not, either.

I let out a frustrated huff. "Well what if you weren't?" I ask. I spare a glance at Cas, who looks like he's trying to dissect my brain with his stare. I go on. "Picture it, you know? If we were just normal, we would have gone to catch a movie. Me, you, and Sam. Sam and I would have fought over whether to get Twizzlers or Skittles, and we would have made you pick, and you would have picked Twizzlers because Twizzlers are awesome, but Sam would have thrown such a bitch fit that we would have gotten both, and then after the movie we'd spend the whole ride home talking about how cool the last battle scene was but that it really sucks that Michelle Rodriguez can't seem to ever survive anything she's in, and… and…" That's when I realize that I'm rambling about something that will never happen, that didn't happen, and that can't ever happen now. Because there are no movies anymore and Sammy's gone and Cas probably wouldn't have picked us for friends if he had the choice, anyway.

Well, maybe Sam. Maybe Cas would have picked Sam.

I drive in silence after that. Cas is quiet, too, for a while. Then, out of the blue, Cas breaks the silence to say, "Michelle Rodriguez _is_ quite attractive."

I turn to grin at him, but Cas is keeping his face carefully blank as he stares out the windshield. Then his eyes slide to me, and his mouth twitches in an almost-smile.

I go back to driving, and Cas adds pretty girls and movies about blue people to his stack of imaginary conversation cards.

* * *

"You know," Bobby says one morning as I pick the chocolate chips out of a granola bar. "We wouldn't have to stop as often if you'd let someone else drive the Impala."

I flick the chocolate chips one-by-one into the grass. "What do you mean?" I mumble. "I let Chuck drive that one time."

"Come on, Dean."

I lean back against the Impala, peering across the street at the gas station that Yeager, Cas, and Chuck are sifting through. We usually don't stop at gas stations anymore. They're almost always completely looted. And when Yeager steps out, I can tell by the frustrated expression on his face that they didn't find anything.

I don't worry too much about it. We had some decent luck at a CVS yesterday, after all. Managed to snag some juice and prescription meds.

"Dean? Are you listening to me?"

I look at Bobby. "Depends on whether or not you were talking."

"Don't sass me, you idgit. I was _saying_ that it's time to teach Cas how to drive."

Cas exits the gas station next with Chuck trailing behind. Chuck is holding a plastic funnel. I have no idea why.

Bobby huffs when I don't answer him. "Boy, I'm sure Yeager will teach him if you don't wanna—"

"All right, Bobby, all right," I snap. I raise my voice as Cas and Chuck are crossing the road. "Cas? Get in the car. You're driving today."

Cas stops and exchanges a wary glance with Chuck. Then Chuck sends him a God-be-with-you pat on the shoulder and heads to the van.

When Cas gets to the car he stops in front of the hood. He knows which seat he has to be in to drive, but he looks like he's afraid I'll tackle him if he actually tries to get behind the wheel. I sigh and open up the driver side door with a sweep of my hand. "In you go, Princess," I tell him.

Cas presses his lips tight together, but he gets in without a word. I shut the door after him and get in the passenger side.

"Ooookay," I say once we're settled. I try to hand him the keys, but I have to drop them into his palm before he'll take them. Then begins the preliminaries. I try to remember that Cas has watched me drive a million times, so I stick to the stuff that he can't get from watching. This is how you start it, don't hold it too long, check your mirrors, adjust the seat, you're a little shorter than me, seat belt please, oh you've already got it, I'd better put mine on then, you break to shift gears, no, yes, at the same time, no, that's the turn signal, well why the hell would you use the turn signal when nobody else is on the road, okay, you're in drive, now take your foot off the break.

I wait. Seconds pass. The car doesn't move.

I look at Cas's face, and I don't now what I see there. He might be terrified, or angry, or disgusted, or maybe just pissy like the good old days. Maybe he's wishing he still had those wings of his. Maybe he wishes this was an airplane, at least.

Maybe he's just nervous.

"When I taught Sammy to drive, he backed the Impala into a dumpster," I blurt.

Cas looks at me, his face going blank. It's getting easier to talk about Sam, I'm realizing. I can say his name and breathe just fine afterwords. I wonder if Cas will ever talk about his brothers again. Not that I'm going to ask.

I don't know what that little anecdote was supposed to accomplish, but it gets Cas moving. The car rolls forward an inch, and I think I must have made some sort of panicked noise, because Cas immediately brakes again and looks at me, wide-eyed.

"No, go ahead," I tell him. My voice might be a little tight. "Pull into the road."

Cas looks both ways, first. I didn't tell him to do that. He doesn't need to do that, really. I know he did it because I used to do it. I don't mention it.

Then we're on the road, going about five miles per hour. Behind us in the van Yeager honks, making Cas jump, and I flip him off through the open window.

I turn to Cas. "And that," I tell him, "Is how we communicate with other asshat drivers."

Cas nods, pressing down on the accelerator a bit. We get up to thirty miles per hour, then forty-five, and then Cas is saying, "Dean, are you sure this is all right?"

I look at Cas, then follow his gaze to my hand, which is clutching the door a little too tightly. "Yeah," I say, because this is stupid, Cas is doing just fine. "I just uh… think I might take up smoking, is all."

At first I think Cas is going to start a lecture, or be offended, but then he settles back into his seat and pries a hand off of the steering wheel, flexing it. "Yeah," he says. "Me too."

* * *

**Next Chapter: "All the Dead Things" Dean isn't really sure who invited Ghouls to the zombie apocalypse, but he does wish they'd get their teeth out of Castiel's throat.**


	4. All the Dead Things

**Disclaimer: I own nothing. I can't even really claim Yeager, since he was in "The End" long enough to get shot. Sucks.**

* * *

"Look, _free beds_," Chuck hints when we pass up a motel that's just as deserted as the rest of this town.

Chuck has been trading off on riding in the van or the Impala. I can only imagine how boring it can get riding with Yeager and Bobby, but then again Cas and I can't be that much fun, either.

I tried to get Cas to play "I Spy" one day, but Cas just kept picking dirt over and over. It was funny for the first five minutes.

Cas talks to Chuck more than he'll talk to me most days. Chuck is way more curious about God than I am, and in exchange Chuck will spend a good hour explaining pop culture references to Cas. So I'm not too surprised when Cas seconds Chuck's suggestion. "I doubt anyone will mind," Cas points out from the back seat.

"Do you want to spend all night securing a building with fifty rooms and windows?" I challenge.

"Oh, come on," Chuck says, tossing a water bottle from one hand to another. "We haven't seen a Croat in almost a week."

I sigh and pull out my cell, checking for signal, because I haven't been able to get anything on the radio for days now. Can't be a good sign. But the screen indicates two bars of signal, so I nod. "Fine," I say, wondering if this is how my dad felt when Sammy and I used to beg him to stop for ice cream. Sam and I didn't do a lot of whining when we were kids, though. Then again, neither do Chuck and Cas.

I toss the phone backwards, hearing it land in Cas's hands. "Do me a favor and call Bobby to tell them we want to turn around," I tell him.

After a pause, I hear Cas say, "Hello, Bobby. Yes, we're fine. We were wondering if you two would be opposed to stopping at a motel with us."

Chuck turns to me, wide-eyed, and I grin.

"Why… why are you laughing?" Cas says. "I was just suggesting… What do you mean you don't know me well enough? I've known you for years. I don't under—" Cas leans forward and turns to Chuck. "What's an orgy?"

Unfortunately for Chuck—and my windshield—Chuck had just taken a drink when Cas said that. I spend the next ten minutes patting Chuck's back and assuring Cas that no, we're not laughing _at_ him.

* * *

The motel is nice. It's probably nicer than any motel I've ever stayed in, if you look past the body we had to step over to get in the lobby.

"Look, Cas, somebody left you a wardrobe," I say, opening one of the closets in the room we've broken into. I'm pretty sure I'm kidding, since the guy who left these clothes is almost certainly dead. I try not to wonder if it was the guy in the lobby.

Cas barely glances at the closet as he walks past me to head to the bathroom. "No thanks," he says.

"Sure? Looks like the guy was an accountant. Perfect for a reformed nerd-angel such as yourself."

Cas doesn't answer, but he does slam the bathroom door a bit harder than necessary.

I hear a snort from behind me, and I turn to find Chuck in the doorway of the adjoining room. "What?" I demand.

Chuck shakes his head. "You're kind of an ass." Then he adds, "Well I'm off to bed," before I can respond. With that Chuck ducks into his room and shuts the door.

I didn't have a good comeback handy, anyway.

Since I know Bobby and Yeager are already sleeping across the hall, I crawl into the bed closest to the window and stare at the ceiling for a while, almost happy with the familiarity of a temporary roof over my head.

I'm nodding off by the time I hear the _click_ of the bathroom door opening. Then footsteps pad toward the bed next to mine, and in a bleary haze of exhaustion I say, "Turn off the light, bitch."

The footsteps pause, and then there's silence. That's enough to make me realize what I've just done, and I open my eyes to find Cas (_not Sam not Sam not Sam) _frozen by the bed. After a second he nods, gracefully ignoring my mistake. "All right," he murmurs, backtracking to the light switch.

Once the room is dark, I sigh and roll over. _You're losin' it, Winchester_, a voice in my head informs me. Like I didn't know that already.

I'm allowed to bask in my self-pity for approximately twelve seconds, until I hear a _crack_ and a faint grunt of pain from the other side of the room. Startled, I sit up and flick on the bedside lamp, already imagining that some zombie or demon has already caught up to us. Crap, I shouldn't have listened to Chuck. Should have salted the windows, should have…

When the light fills the room, though, I just see Cas. He's bracing against the television stand with one hand, and the other is clutching at his foot.

"Cas?"

Cas turns to me, dropping his foot with a grimace.

"Did you just… stub your toe?"

He doesn't answer. His face is contorted into some horror-struck expression, like he doesn't know whether to be wounded or just appalled. Finally he manages to get his mouth to move. "_Ow_," he says.

I bite the inside of my cheek. "You get used to it," I lie.

Cas wrinkles his nose. "This happens a lot?"

"Well, yeah, if you wander around in the dark."

I'm starting to figure out what it looks like when Cas is moping. It's subtle—just a droop of the shoulders or a crease between his eyebrows every now and then—but that's definitely what Cas is doing when he shuffles back to the bed and collapses on top of the comforter.

_I was an angel once_, his eyes are telling the ceiling. _Sure, Buddy_, the ceiling replies.

I lie back and stare at my own patch of ceiling. And maybe I drift off, but the next time I open my eyes light is streaming through the window and Cas is still staring at the ceiling.

* * *

We decide to stay at the motel. "One day," I said at first, but then Yeager and Bobby were salting the windows and Chuck was drawing devil's traps and I remember shooting Cas a look and asking, "Should I consider this mutiny?"

"I doubt it," Cas said, trying to shake a Reece's Cup out of a vending machine. I ended up smashing the glass in a minute later, and that night we dined on Chex Mix and Honey Buns.

It wasn't so bad. Except… that body.

The dead one? Remember? Yeah. I didn't.

We were putting it off, really. It's a hunter thing, I think. So used to burying, salting and burning our friends that we don't really go to funerals anymore if we can help it. Never mind actually burying a body that's not even ours. He belonged to someone else. He wasn't ours to bury. Wasn't ours to burn.

So Yeager dragged the body outside while we worked on securing the motel. Said he'd "take care of it" once we were finished.

When a day later he told us that the body had disappeared, we should have thought about it a little harder than we did. But. We didn't. We put it from our minds, forgot about it.

A week later, though, we figure out where the body went. What got it, anyway.

It was ghouls, and the ghouls are starving, and now they're everywhere. Attracted first by the dead body and then drawn to live ones once they figured out that this is probably the last meal they're ever gonna get.

So that's how I end up dragging Chuck through the lobby while Bobby tries to cover me with the shotgun. Having to blow the ghouls' heads off is less than ideal, but the rest of the weapons are in the trunk, and I gave Cas the only machete.

That reminds me to do a head count. Yeager is already outside, getting the van started. I've got Chuck. Bobby's next to me. And—

I hear a scream from the hallway behind the lobby, and I know it's Cas. Then it comes again, and then Cas is screaming, screaming, screaming like the ghouls have already gutted him, and a wave of nausea rolls over me so fast I have to stop to breathe. I toss Chuck the keys to the Impala, yelling, "Go, now!" And then I turn and follow the screams.

I get to the hallway and see about four ghouls at first, pushing at each other. The hallway isn't wide enough for all of them to get through at once, but they're so hungry, they just claw and scratch and howl without noticing that they're not getting any closer.

I realize too late that I don't have a weapon, then I remember, hey, they're ghouls, they're just monsters in the shapes of people, and you can fight them, Dean, come on now. I yank one back, make a hole, and it bites me but I push forward, ripping my arm out of its mouth.

Cas is there, in the floor, kicking weakly at the two ghouls on top of him. There's a pile of beheaded ghouls behind them, and I see blood, and—I almost sob in relief when I spot the machete on the floor at my feet.

I remember picking up the machete, and I remember the wet thuds of heads dropping to the floor. Then there's Cas still making some god-awful sounds, and I'm saying too loudly, "Shh, shh, you're fine, give me your arm," and then I've got him over my shoulder. Running. A straggler jumps over the front desk, and I slice through its neck as I go. Crossing the parking lot. The van is gone, but the Impala, oh, God bless Chuck, he's got the Impala running with the back door open, and I drop Cas inside, crawl in after him, and slam the door shut. Squealing tires, and then we're safe, we're safe.

"Cas, we made it," I tell him, but Cas doesn't answer.

I look down, and want to throw up again. But, no, stop, Dean, just look. Really look. It's just a lot of blood, a lot of rent skin and bruises. All his insides are still on the inside, and you saw his legs moving earlier, and he—he was breathing, too, you know, because you can't scream if you can't breathe, but now? Is he breathing now?

"Is he dead?" Chuck asks, on cue. His voice sounds like crumbled paper.

"No," I tell him before I check his pulse. Then I do, and Cas has one, and I sigh, catching sight of the rise and fall of his chest. "No," I say again, but it's the truth this time. I look at Cas's face, at the blood that runs through his left eyebrow and back into his hair. "You're not dead," I say, and it sounds like an order.

Cas's eyes squeeze shut tighter, so I know he's awake. I tell Chuck to grab me the first aid kit from the glove compartment, and the sewing kit too, if it's in there. Once I have these things I turn back to Cas. "You hear me?" I demand. "You're not dying today."

Cas rocks his head to the side and makes a noise that sounds like, "Wmfgrudgen." But I hear it as "Yes, Dean," and I use that to convince myself that, no, Cas is not dying. Not today.

* * *

Cas doesn't die the next day, either.

Or the next.

Ghouls can track, we know, so Chuck keeps driving and stops as little as possible while I stick to the back and keep Cas alive. I try to call Bobby, then Yeager, but I can't get a signal, so I send a text to Yeager, mentally cheering it on like that message is The Little Engine That Could. Three hours I get a response: _Wait 4 us, where?_ And I text him back while telling Chuck to pull over so that Bobby and Yeager can find us.

Once we're stopped I slide Cas out of the car so that I can set him down in the grass for a minute, changing a bandage on his back while Chuck cleans the blood out of my backseat. At first Cas is dead weight, but at my prodding he stirs, manages to sit up if I prop him against the Impala just right. Grumbles something in a language that might be French and lets me apply clean bandages.

The van rolls up when the sun is hanging low in the sky, and we all exchange pleasantries like "Hi, glad you're not dead, wow nice bite, hope that arm doesn't fall off." Then I'm back at the Impala, eyeing a red stain that's blossoming through the gauze around Cas's head. I can hear Bobby talking to Chuck in low tones from near the van, and I'm so focused on straining to hear them that I don't hear the footsteps rustle the grass until Yeager is right behind me, and I start, glaring upwards.

Yeager tears his gaze away from Cas and gives me that look that I saw on my dad once, when I was little and brought in a turtle that had been hit by a car. Told my dad I was gonna save it, and Dad had given me that look, told me that its back was broken and that he'd "take care of it."

That time, I let my dad take the turtle outside and out of my sight so that he could put the thing out of its misery. Today, I tell Yeager to get his ass back to the van and find me an extra roll of gauze.

Yeager trudges off, shaking his head, and I pat Cas's pale cheek. Cas's head lolls against the passenger door of the Impala where I've got him propped up, but after a few seconds he opens his eyes. "It's getting colder," he informs me, sipping at the orange juice I've just given him.

_You've lost too much blood_, I don't say. "Yeah, it's almost November. We're headed out soon, you gotta pee or anything?"

Cas shakes his head. "Is it raining?" he asks.

"No." Crap, I was going to give him another Lortab, but he already seems a little fried.

Cas closes his eyes again, wincing through a half-cough. "Maybe it will be, once it's November."

I stare at him a second, then laugh. "November Rain," I murmur. "Didn't know you liked Guns 'N Roses."

"Like Poison better," he slurs, his head sliding against his shoulder.

It's not until after we're back on the road, Cas tucked in the back with his legs draped over Chuck's lap, when I realize that Cas was trying to point out that _I_ like Poison better. Cas likes Guns 'N Roses.

* * *

Cas gets better. Slowly. We douse him in probably way more antiseptic than we should have, and once I thought I overdosed him on pain meds, but after a week or so his wounds are healing and he can hold a conversation without checking out halfway through and I can look at him without wondering how I'm gonna fight off a reaper this time around.

He's jumpier now, though, and he doesn't get out of the car unless he absolutely has to.

He's also crabbier than usual. Chuck has stopped riding in the Impala.

"Wake up," I tell Cas when I pull over for a rest stop. He doesn't stir at first. It's always tough to wake Cas up, these days.

I reach into the backseat to flick him in the ear, and he swipes at my hand. "Wherarwe?" he asks, blinking his eyes open.

"Still on the highway."

Cas sits up, rubbing at the scars in his chest. "Not what I meant."

"We just hit Pennsylvania."

Cas nods, leaning back against the door with his eyes closed. "Don't lean against the door," I tell him for the hundredth time, and feel a little guilty when he complies, bending forward with a hiss through his teeth. He takes the opportunity to glance around us and ask, "Where's the van?"

I pause. Cas looks at me, and I admit, "Looking for gas."

Cas runs a hand over his face. "Are we out?"

"Not quite," I say. Then I turn to hide my face, because Cas can be a really creepy human lie detector when pays enough attention. I stretch my arms out across the seat to make the motion seem more natural.

"When did that happen?" Cas asks, startling me.

I glance back. Cas is looking at my right arm, where the sleeve has ridden up. The bite mark from the ghoul is visible now, red and ragged. "You're asking a lot of questions today," I observe, dropping my arm in my lap.

Cas leans back in his seat, quiet again, because he's already figured it out. He's quiet for a long time.

"You know, you probably saved all our lives," I tell him at last when the silence gets too heavy. "With the ghouls. You kept them from getting past the hallway. If they'd gotten to the lobby we never would have made it to the parking lot." I watch his face as I say this, but Cas doesn't so much as twitch.

After a long moment of silence, Cas gets out of the car with a long groan. I follow, just so I can stretch out a little. I look across the car, but I don't see Cas. Where the hell did he get to so fast?

I walk around the car and almost bump into him. I didn't see him because he was doubled over behind the car with one hand against the still-open door. "Cas?"

Cas starts when he knows I've spotted him, and he tries to stand up quicker than his bruised ribs will allow. He barks out a word that I don't think an angel of the Lord has any business using, and I tell him so.

Cas straightens just enough to send me a glare. "Do I _look _like an angel of the Lord to you?" he demands.

I snap my mouth shut.

After another second of glaring Cas stands up, more carefully this time. His eyes are tightening in the corners, and I know he just wants to double over again, or sit down, but he won't. After a second he relaxes, lets out a sigh and folds his arms over the roof of the car. "Weren't we supposed to take up smoking?" he mumbles into his jacket sleeve.

"Right," I say, remembering. "Add that to our bucket list. Right next to bungee jumping and watching _The Bucket List_."

Cas looks up just to tilt his head at me, questioning. I wait patiently for him to say, "What do you mean?" or "I don't understand that reference, Dean." But after a minute he nods and tries to fake a, "Ha, ha, ha."

I pat him on the shoulder once, shaking my head. "Yeah," I say, going back to my side of the car. "We'll work on that."

* * *

**Next Chapter: Actually not written yet. I'll update this as soon as I get some pages down.**


	5. The Wars

**A/N: First I want to thank the amazing reviewers from the last chapter. It was the biggest response so far in the story, which is why I felt like generally a horrible person for taking SO LONG to post this chapter. That is not how it's supposed to work, right? But I've never posted a story that I hadn't had completely finished beforehand, and as it turns out, it's pretty tough. That's why I made sure this chapter was extra long and I'm posting it literally the minute I finished/edited it.  
**

**I hope y'all don't give up on me and stop reviewing because of my tardiness. But I actually ended up quite liking this chapter, for all the trouble it caused me, and I hope you enjoy this chapter as well.  
**

**Disclaimer: I still don't own Supernatural. There are also a lot of musical artists mentioned in this chapter, and I certainly don't own those, either. Or _The Hardy Boys_. And to those who like country music... I should probably apologize for Dean's attitude. He really is a meanie pants when he puts his mind to it.  
**

* * *

The nightmares start on a pothole-riddled back road in Brookville, Pennsylvania. The first time Cas wakes up gasping, I ask him what it was about. He tells me that he doesn't know how to explain it in English, and I don't ask again.

After that it's harder to tell when Cas has had a nightmare, but I think I've got the signs figured out. He's had trouble getting used to dreaming, so he'll wake up sometimes and stare vacantly out the windshield like he can't figure out how he got there, like he can't figure out what's real. When he wakes up from a nightmare, he'll do the same thing, but he's more frantic about getting back to reality. He touches things, the dashboard, the window, the sleeve on his jacket. And then, when he's sure that his nightmare is behind him, he'll sink into his seat and press his head against the cold window, and I won't yell at him for it.

When I had nightmares and Sammy was still around, Sam would ask me questions the second I woke up. "What do you want for breakfast and was anything good on TV after I went to sleep and have you seen my laptop bag, I can't find it anywhere." After a while I asked Sam why he did this, and he told me that it was something about helping me forget the nightmare, that if you think of something else as soon as you wake up then you probably won't remember the dream you had.

I try this on Cas exactly once.

He wakes up from a particularly nasty dream, I can tell, because he's just about hyperventilating as he stares, wide-eyed, out the windshield. He stares for a long time, even though we've pulled over for a rest stop. So I clear my throat, and ask, "Hey, Cas, what song do you think is longer, 'Bohemian Rhapsody' or 'Baba O'Riley?'"

Cas doesn't move. I don't think he heard me.

"Cas?" I snap my fingers in front of his face, and he blinks. "You in there?" He doesn't answer, so I put a hand on his shoulder, and he jumps so hard he smacks his head off the window.

I snap my hand back and return to my side of the car, watching while he puts a hand to his chest and tries to slow his breathing. "Sorry," he says when he's calmed down some.

"Noooo problem," I reply, starting the car. "I'll just. Google it or something." Then I murmur, "Might still have internet in China," under my breath, and if Cas heard me that time, he doesn't show it.

* * *

I've realized that we're not going west—we're going wherever we'll find gas.

Seems a little counterproductive, doesn't it?

But if (when) we do run out of gas, it can't be here. Because here is cracked pavement and empty shelves shattered windows and we can't stay here another day. All the food we have left fits comfortably in my jacket pocket, and it's a package of Slim Jims, in case you were curious.

I rifle through an empty Toyota, a _really _empty Toyota, looking for something that will make up for its dry gas tank. Food would be great. Water would be better.

As I'm going through the glove compartment, pushing past the folded papers, my hand hovers over a half-empty pack of cigarettes.

So that's how I end up on the roof of an old bank, smoking my first (okay, there was that one time when I was fourteen) cigarette with an ex-angel and prophet of the Lord, hiding from Bobby like teenagers.

Chuck already has a lighter on him.

"Where is Yeager?" Cas asks, studying the glowing end of the cigarette pinched in his fingers.

I take the lighter from Chuck. "Said something about not being able to run from Croats with tar in his lungs," I answer.

Cas starts to reply and cuts himself off when he coughs smoke through his nose. I laugh at him, but a second later I do the same thing. And Cas doesn't laugh, but Chuck does.

"We haven't seen a Croat in…" But Chuck trails off this time, either because he's stopped keeping track or because he's realized that we haven't seen another living person in almost as long.

Cas sighs, looks like he's going to finish what he was saying before, opens his mouth, closes it, and settles on staring at the smoke curling above our heads. Then he finally mutters, "I think Jimmy was a runner."

Chuck and I stare at him. It's been a long time since I've looked at Cas and remembered that he was wearing someone else. But Cas doesn't really look like Jimmy at all, not anymore. Not with the scars that run red and fresh down his neck, the way his elbow won't bend quite right. Not with the tears in his shirt, the jacket that's too light for November, the boots that don't fit.

"We need to find you some damn clothes," I say, and Chuck grunts his agreement.

Cas looks down at his boots, scuffing them against the concrete. Then Yeager's voice trails up, and he's too far away to hear for sure, but it sounds to me like he found gasoline. "Time to head out," I say, dabbing my half-finished cigarette against the ledge of the roof. Chuck trades me the lighter for the almost-empty pack. I nudge Cas along as we head out.

Cas drops his cigarette butt, grinding it under his heel as he goes, and I spend the rest of the day wondering where in the hell he learned to do that.

* * *

My favorite stop so far has to be a sporting goods store that we hit just on the edge of sundown. There's no ammo left, but we find two sleeping bags and a coat for Cas and a hunting lamp that Bobby puts in the back of the van. Says he used to have one just like it.

This is the first night we've felt safe enough to all be asleep at once. Since the ghouls.

Chuck finds a hammock on display and claims it as his bed for the night. Bobby and I take the sleeping bags. Yeager goes out to sleep in the van, says he's gotten used to it, and Cas sleeps on the floor near a rack of running shorts, using his new coat as a pillow.

Everyone settles slowly, and sleeps.

Except Cas.

I listen for his snores, knowing that he's somewhere near my feet. But he stays quiet, and I wonder if maybe it's too soon for him to sleep without a lookout, after all.

"How's the coat?" I ask in a voice I hope is low enough to keep from waking Bobby, who's only a couple feet to my left.

Cas shuffles in the darkness, like he has to fluff his coat before he can answer my question. "I think there are feathers in it," he says.

"Huh."

We're silent, for a while.

"You still need clothes for when it warms up again," I tell him.

"Hey, Dean?"

"What?"

"Do you still dream about Hell?"

I don't answer him for a long time.

"No," I lie.

"Oh."

"… Do you?"

"… No."

"Oh." Another long pause. "I guess… that's good."

Cas answers with a snore, so I roll over and go to sleep. And when I dream, I dream of chains and wing beats and a light so bright that it burns me up until there's nothing left to save.

* * *

There is a sad, sad campground that we pass through on the way to Nowhere In Particular. Bobby has been teaching Cas to clean guns since Ohio, so that's what Cas is working on now over a chipped and carved picnic table.

I lean against a tree nearby and watch him fumble with the gun pieces. Then, after letting him completely dismantle the thing, I say, "You know you don't have to take the gun completely apart to clean it."

Cas stops moving. Slowly puts down the parts he was holding. And gives me a very unhappy look.

"You're just supposed to field strip it," I explain, and yes, I do feel like an ass, thank you for asking. But screwing with Chuck gets old after a while, and Bobby and Yeager have zero tolerance for my dazzling sense of humor.

Cas turns back to the completely dismantled gun and just. Sits there.

Well, I at least expected an eye-roll. Geez. "I'm just." I clear my throat. "I mean, it's okay. It just takes longer if you take the whole thing a… part…" And Cas is glaring at that gun now, and I kind of feel like I just knocked a child's ice-cream in the dirt. "You know, forget it. You could always just… stick to knives? I can show you some stuff." I pull the knife out of my boot, and Cas pushes himself up from the picnic table. "Here, we can work on—"

But before I can even hand Cas my knife, he's right in front of my nose. Before I can reel back I feel something push and twist my arm until I'm forced to swivel around, and then Cas shoves me into the tree. The knife isn't in my hands anymore, but I can feel the flat blade press cold against the back of my neck.

"I think I'm good," Cas says. He lets me go, and I turn, wide-eyed, watching as he drops my knife into the dirt and walks the two steps back to the picnic table. "Now show me how to put this back together."

So I pick up my knife. I put it back in my boot. And I go to sit across from Cas, but—"Wait," I say. Cas looks up, wary, as I pull another knife out of my belt.

I flip it in my hand and hold it out to Cas, handle-first.

Cas looks at the knife, then frowns at me. "That's—"

"The demon knife," I finish for him. "You'd, ah… It would be more useful. With you. Apparently."

Cas's frown deepens, but it's different this time. It's guilt, now. "I didn't mean to—" Cas starts, but I shake my head and say, "Just keep it for me, will ya? Probably won't ever have to use it, anyway."

Cas takes it. Puts it in his belt. I sit down. And again I talk him through cleaning a gun, and he watches while I put it back together.

* * *

Cas has developed a—how should I say—_unhealthy_ obsession with country music. See, we'll find tapes now and then in other cards when we're looking for gas. It started off innocent, you know, I just thought he didn't know better when he'd say things like, "Oh, look, a George Straight album," or, "Have you heard of Kenny Chesney?" Then one day, with a completely straight face, he held out a Dixie Chicks tape and said, "I think I've heard the first one on side B. You should play it."

So I kicked him out of the Impala.

He hoards these tapes now, and plays them in the van when we're stopped for the night. But sometimes we'll be in the middle of driving and he'll still try to trick me into playing those damn tapes.

"But I thought you said that Lynyrd Skynyrd was southern rock."

"There is a line, Cas. 'Sweet Home Alabama' is an overplayed country abomination, and I won't have it in my car."

"I think you need to learn the art of compromise."

"I think you need to learn the art of getting your country ass out of my car."

That's how it usually ends, and then it turns into a sort of hostage situation, "If you take Cas I'll take Chuck off your hands," and then Cas takes his pile of tapes to the van and Chuck scampers over to me, asking, "So, does this mean I get to ride in the front?"

I level him with a searching look. "What's the greatest band of all time?" I ask him.

Chuck winces. "Led… Zeppelin?" he guesses.

I consider his answer, and nod once. "I'll allow it." So Chuck gets in Cas's seat—Sam's seat—whoever's seat—and I let Bobby and Yeager deal with Shania Twain for a while.

But Cas won't sleep in the van, not since the nightmares, so when the sun sets and we pull over for the night Cas comes trudging back, and I maybe let him play a Trace Adkins song once. Very quietly.

* * *

Cas is staring at a mannequin. Staring it down, really. The mannequin smiles back, sporting some denim-coated outfit that probably went out of style a year ago.

"I don't like this place," Cas declares.

I've got an arm full of plaid shorts, because Cas likely won't notice that I'm going out of my way to make him look like a frat boy douche bag.

I get my kicks where I can.

"Dude, you haven't even looked at anything. I need my clothes back, man," I tell him. "You've ruined two of my shirts already, and that flannel one was my favorite." I try to hand him the pile of clothes. "Try these on, huh?"

Cas takes the clothes, but his eyes stay on the mannequin while he backs away. "I'm sure they're fine," he says. "Let's just go."

"Yes, _lets_," Bobby says from behind us, and I turn around.

"Thought you were with Chuck and Yeager?" I say.

"I was. It's your turn to babysit."

"What do you mean?"

Bobby turns around and heads for the front of the store. "See for yourself," he says, leading us out.

Bobby takes us past the food court and into a store that's got mens' suits in the window. I can already hear Yeager's laugh from inside.

The store is small and nearly in shambles, but it's still fully stocked. Nobody has any use for formal wear during the apocalypse, I guess.

I'm about to ask Bobby what's going on when something light hits me behind the ear. "What the—" I look down at the orange cylinder at my feet. "Dude. A _Nerf_—"

Yeager's head pops up from behind a floor display of shoes. Then he points his Nerf gun past me and shoots. By the time I've turned around to see what he's shooting at, Chuck is reaching out of a dressing room and yanking Cas behind the open door. "I call angel!" Chuck yells.

"Oh, come on!" Yeager complains. When he ducks back behind the shoes and army-rolls to the cash register, I notice for the first time that he and Chuck are wearing black suits.

I look at Bobby. "Is this really happening?" I ask.

"They've been at this for almost half an hour," Bobby says.

Yeager crawls out from behind the cash register, toy gun in hand, until he reaches Bobby and uses the wheelchair as a shield. I roll my eyes and grab him by the shoulders, hauling him up and holding him back at arm's length. "Are you on something?" I turn to Bobby. "Is he on something?" Back to Yeager. "Where'd you find _drugs_, anyway?"

Chuck heaves a sigh and comes out from behind the dressing room door, and Cas takes that as his opportunity to escape, walking swiftly back to the rack of jackets. "We're not _high_, we're _bored_," Chuck says. "I swear if I read _The Hardy Boys Case Files #27 _one more time I'm gonna lose my freaking mind."

For the next minute and a half while Chuck rants about how Joe should stop whining about his dead girlfriend, I watch Cas graze a jacket with his fingertips. I wonder if we should try to track down a new trench coat before we leave.

Cas's hand freezes on the jacket as I'm watching, and then he says, "Chuck, hush."

Chuck shuts up immediately, and I'm thinking, _Hey, neat trick_, when Cas drops his clothes and blurts, "Demons."

Oh.

I barely have the time to be impressed at how efficient we are as we all simultaneously about-face and high-tail it out of there. Yeager is pushing Bobby, Chuck has dropped his Nerf gun, and I'm unnecessarily nudging Cas in the shoulder, yelling, "Go, go, go!" as we run and leap over the overturned clothes racks.

And I don't know what happens when we get out of the store. I really don't. I know that one minute I'm right behind Cas, watching the others corner around around a jewelry store, and the next something is yanking me back and I'm alone.

There's a hand crushing my arm.

"Hiya, Dean," says a woman's voice behind me, and then the hand shoves me into the nearest store.

She ties me up without another word, and it's almost embarrassing how easy I make it for her. I don't have the demon knife, and let's face it, I'm out of practice. Once I'm secured to a rolling chair she stands back against a shelf of candles and looks at me with a satisfied smirk. "The other demons _said_ you were hot," she comments, nodding.

I flash her my most charming smile, which probably isn't so charming anymore, but whatever. "You're not so bad yourself," I shoot back, looking over the blonde bombshell she's wearing. Even still has a pink manicure. "Well, except that you're, uh, dead, and a demon, and your real body was probably super ugly." And oh my god, I need spend more time coming up with demon insults.

The demon's smile flickers, though, and she pulls a small knife out of her belt.

"Where are the others?" I demand, hoping they just ran ahead. Except, no. Cas hadn't even turned the corner yet when I got taken. "Where's Cas?"

The demon starts to chip away at her nail polish with the knife. "Probably at Claire's picking out your friendship bracelets," she replies.

And now the demon is out-bantering me. Sonofabitch.

"Why are you here?" I ask.

The demon lowers her knife and blows the chipped polish off of her hand. "Oh, Dean, we've always been here," she says. "Not too close, mind you, we were afraid that ex-angel would sense us, but we've been watching. You're not a very interesting lot, you know."

I glare at her. "Then why the hell have you been following us?"

Her eyes finally flick to me, and she waves her knife as she says, "Excuse me, have you noticed that you're the one tied to a chair? This isn't an interrogation, son!"

I glare some more.

The demon takes a step toward me and sighs. "Dean. Have you not _wondered_ why you haven't run into any Croatoans in weeks?"

I have wondered. "I figured people were dying out too quick for the virus to spread," I said.

The demon grins, wide and flat. "Try again."

"You…" I think I know the answer, but it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. "You cleared a path for us?"

"That's right," she sing-songs. "See, Lucifer is, well, you know the story. They call him prideful for a reason. He doesn't much want your little posse dead. He wants you to rot in the world you tried so hard to keep from him. But he can't have you running around trying to screw up all his plans either, can he? Here, here, let me present it like a peace offering. You leave us alone, we make sure my Daddy's apocalypse doesn't run you over."

I roll my eyes. "Yeah, I'd say 'Go to Hell,' but that seems redundant."

She ignores me. "Here's the details. See, we have your friends tied up somewhere in this mall, just like you. And if we can't make some sort of arrangement, well, my friends have to kill _your _friends and it all gets very messy, so. Listen close." She leans forward, resting her hands over my arms. "Condition one: you hand over that demon knife."

Then it clicks.

They think I have the knife.

Which means they didn't check Cas for it.

A slow smile works its way through my face before I can think to stop it. Then I say, "Well. I would. But… I don't have it."

The demon stares. The grin slides off her face. She's realizing. "If you don't have it…"

I keep an eye on her knife.

Instead of attacking me, though, she tries to run straight out to warn her demon friends. But I kick my feet back and get in her way so that she crashes into me, toppling us both over. She throws out a blind stab and I twist, letting the knife slice through the rope around my wrist. It doesn't cut it completely, but a sharp pull breaks the rope the rest of the way and I'm up.

The demon is already darting out of the store, and I scramble up to follow her. We run past windows and windows of displays until she halts in front of a video game store, gaping at whatever is inside.

I come up behind her. Cas is standing in the middle of the store with three dead demons at his feet and the demon knife loose in his hand. And in the back of the store is Chuck, Bobby, and Yeager, watching over a live demon stuck in a demon trap drawn with—I squint at the object in Chuck's hand—a dry erase marker?

The blonde demon takes one look at all this and ditches her meat suit before you can say "Cas is a bad-ass."

Once she's gone, Cas looks up at me and tilts his head. "Did you want one of them alive?" he asks me, pointing with the knife to the trapped demon.

I peer around his shoulder, getting a good look at the seething man with black eyes and a horrible haircut. "Nah," I tell him.

So Cas tosses the knife to Yeager, who stabs the demon in the back of the neck. Then we stand back and watch the flash of demon life sizzle away like it's a sad grand finale on the fourth of July.

* * *

**Next (LAST) Chapter: Camp Chitaqua is not the place for a happy ending, but something will begin here, something that Dean will later call, "The Era of Killing Sam."**


End file.
